[Paul Dewhurst]

I am preparing a Nynja U.K. microlight ( LSA) for electric power, it’s not a trike, but not dissimilar to what to expect from doing the same to a two seat trike. We are using a Gieger HPD50 motor – 70KW peak, 50 continuous. So not dissimilar to a 912 UL power wise.

We are using a 32kwhr battery array, that are using Samsung 50E cells. Weight will be 150kg for the battery packs.

Duration if we fly nice and slow at best glide speed will hopefully be around 1 hour with some reserves.

So just now for a two seater it’s a lot of battery mass and not inconsiderable cost for a modest endurance.

With a fast charge and some optimisation it might soon get so it’s viable for a school, but it isn’t going to be viable for cross country carefree touring until things progress by several orders of magnitude.

But it makes a lot more sense for a single seat light trike. The mission for such a machine is mostly local flying for an hour in the morning or evening or playing with the thermals during the day. Then only a modest power motor and battery is needed and cost although a bit more than a gas set up, is not so unreasonable.

And things will get more capable and price more reasonable as we go on. It will take a while but in another 5 years or so it may not be an uncommon sight in the sport.